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Monday, 14 December 2015

AMIDST the
obfuscation on the government’s decision to revive the dialogue process with
Pakistan, one conclusion stands out: The generals in Rawalpindi have prevailed.
They had insisted that the National Security Advisers of India and Pakistan
would not meet to discuss only terrorism. In doing so, the Pakistani generals
had challenged the decision taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his
Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif at their meeting in Ufa, Russia, in July
this year, on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation
conference.

It was also
becomingly increasingly clear since about a year that Pakistan desired that the
full bilateral dialogue be resumed. That position was being conveyed both
publicly and privately, especially in the Track II circuit. The generals were
supportive of this move because it would diffuse the terrorism issue within the
full process. It would also help in toning down international concerns about
Pakistan’s dangerous approaches in its neighbourhood.

Mr Modi had rightly
rejected the Pakistani generals’ demand in August. In December, he gave in by
allowing the NSAs, accompanied by the two Foreign Secretaries, to meet in
Bangkok to discuss a host of subjects, including Jammu and Kashmir and
terrorism. This was a double concession, on substance as well as venue; the
latter because the meeting was to take place in Delhi. Was this a wise move?

Some argue that the
essence of diplomacy lies in showing flexibility at the right time. There is
merit in this argument, but only as a general proposition. The weight of
experience of dealing with Pakistan shows that the generals always construe
flexibility as weakness and not as maturity. Besides, the lesson they derive is
that those who are flexible can be pushed to make ever more concessions. There
is little doubt that they will interpret Mr Modi’s concession as a signal that
he too can be pushed.

It is being put out
that the Bangkok meeting enabled External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to
visit Islamabad to take part in the Heart of Asia conference on Afghanistan.
This too is not accurate, for she could have made the visit in any case. During
the visit, she could have met Pakistan’s leaders on the sidelines to discuss
the Afghan situation and also make it clear that India looked forward to the
NSAs meeting on the basis of the Ufa decision. That would have been
diplomatically entirely tenable. Now this is only an academic question, but it
may well come back to haunt Mr Modi if the calculations which have made him
take such a risky course prove incorrect.

There is no doubt
that Sushma Swaraj did well to ensure that the India-Pakistan joint statement
issued on the conclusion of her visit to Islamabad gave prominence to India’s
terrorism concerns. Pakistan agreed that the NSAs will continue to discuss all
issues related to terrorism. It also mentioned the assurance of the Pakistani
side to “expedite the early conclusion of the Mumbai trial”. Interestingly,
both sides also “resolved to cooperate” to eliminate terrorism.

Over the past few
days, government sources are asserting to the media that all this will put
Pakistan to the test. Only the naive will believe that the Pakistani
establishment will take such tests seriously. They have never done so in the
past. In 2004, Musharraf committed not to allow the territories in Pakistan’s
control to be used to launch terrorist attacks on India. In 2008, the Mumbai
attack occurred.

One senior source is
reported to have revealed that Nawaz Sharif told Modi the generals were serious
to go after the terrorist groups, including the Lashkar-e-Taiba. Decisive
action against the LeT would require a fundamental transformation of the
security doctrine Pakistan has followed since it fomented insurgency in Punjab.
Pakistan may well calibrate the use of terror and even dismantle a portion of
the infrastructure that sustains it, but it will not abandon it.

India-Pakistan
engagement will have a new name — Comprehensive Bilateral Dialogue. However,
all the issues that were contained in the Composite Dialogue which was
finalised in 1998 are still there. The modalities and the schedule are to be
looked afresh by the Foreign Secretaries. One obvious change would flow from
the decision empowering the NSAs to handle the terrorism issue. Earlier, the
Home Secretaries of the two countries did so.

Will Pakistan want
that the Jammu and Kashmir issue be given the same profile that terrorism will
inevitably have as the NSAs will now discuss it? The question is significant
for it had taken a year and a half to work out the modalities of the Composite
Dialogue because Pakistan wanted the Kashmir question to be profiled. That
demand was successfully resisted. Indian diplomats will now have to be careful
to prevent any new attempt.

The Siachen issue
has also been included for discussions. There is a consensus among Indian
security thinkers that Indian forces should not withdraw from the Saltoro
ridge. The increasing Chinese presence in the northern areas will harm India’s
security interests. The Army has also resisted any thinking to withdraw, for if
the Pakistanis break commitments and occupy those heights, nothing short of an
all-out war will dislodge them. It would have been appropriate to drop the
issue altogether though Pakistan would

have resisted the
move. It gives high priority to the forces withdrawing from the heights.

Some clarifications
would be needed on the government’s August and December positions. Also, if the
Pakistanis have given an indication that they will stop meeting the Hurriyat
before and after official dialogues in India? Mr Modi’s decision on the issue was
correct and should not be diluted. Finally, what will be the government’s
policy if another terrorist attack takes place from Pakistani soil? The same
tired approach of breaking off dialogue or a more robust response?

Mr Modi has now
invested in peace and cooperation with Pakistan and also visiting Pakistan for
the Saarc summit in 2016. He will, as is his wont, wish to make that visit lead
to transforming relations. The generals will see this as an opportunity to
exploit, and India will have to keep up its guard.

Lieut Lalit Thapliyal,
who was awarded the coveted Sword of Honour at the passing-out parade of the
Indian Military Academy yesterday, was in all probability the first cadet from
the Garhwal region to get this highest honour in the 83-year-old glorious
history of the academy.

Lalit, who belongs
to Adali village, near Kotdwar in Pauri Garhwal district, is a Rimocollion. He
had won the overall silver medal in the National Defence Academy (NDA) before
joining to the IMA for further training. While boys from the Garhwal region had
been coming to the IMA in increasing numbers in the recent times and a few of
them had even won gold and silver medals, the coveted Sword of Honour had
eluded them. Akshat Joshi from Kumaon was awarded the Sword of Honour in 2013.

The Sword of Honour
is presented to a cadet who excels in the passing-out course. The best cadet
gets this prestigious honour. Lalit has been a keen sportsman, which can be
gauged from the fact that shortly after passing out of the IMA, he left to play
hockey for an Army team and would return to Dehradun by December end. An avid
sportsman, Lalit also loves to play squash and has been part of the IMA squash
team.

A proud father, DN
Thapliyal, is vice principal at Rashtriya Indian Military College (RIMC),
Dehradun, and has completed 28 years of service.“It is a proud moment not only for me but
also for the entire Uttarakhand that a local boy has bagged the coveted Sword
of Honour,” Thapliyal said while speaking with The Tribune. Asked whether his
son was the first Garhwali to win the Sword of Honour, Thapliyal said he had
enquired about it and in all probability he indeed was the first.

Thapliyal’s daughter
Swarnima is a Captain in the Indian Army. Capt Swarnima’s husband Gaurav, who
hails from Himachal Pradesh, had bagged the Sword of Honour in 2010.

He said it was a
matter of honour for him that his children had kept up the glorious tradition
of Garhwalis by joining the Army. He admitted that institutions such as the
RIMC and also Sainik School play an important role in grooming and encouraging
school students to make a career in the Army.

Lalit studied at
Silver Oak School, Garhi Cantt, before joining the RIMC in class VII. His
mother Yashoda, a teacher by profession, gives the credit to his son for
successfully completing training.

Imagine the Indian
Army Brigade commander in Ladakh tweeting over a face-off between Indian and Chinese
soldiers.

That's one of the
things senior officials at Army headquarters here claim to be aiming at in
coming years by expanding the scope of their social media domain. There would
be a caution on strategic and operational details and anything that goes out in
public domain would have to be information which is not classified, the
officials, however, underline.

A ministry of
defence (MoD) expert committee recently recommended that senior commanders
shall have a participative social media presence through blogs so that they
stay connected with the rank and file. The committee advocated 'proactive' use
of social media to counter rumours and sensitising officers on its use.

As of Thursday, the
Indian Army had 34-lakh, 17 thousand, two hundred and thirty one (3417231)
followers on its Facebook page and the number growing by the hour.

And going forward,
in its expanding social media base, Army is also looking at a situation where
it could cut down on its recruitment advertisement costs for officials believe
a large number of youth are motivated to join them on being given an exposure
of day to day activities of the force.

An analysis of the
Army's Facebook page reveals that 48% of the followers belong to the age group
of 18-24 years while 6% fall in the 13-17 age group. However, women constitute
only 9% the total following.

Further reading into
Army's Facebook presence throws other interesting facts.

While over 25 lakh
followers are English speaking, 40-odd thousand Hindi speakers follow the Army
on Facebook. This, followed by close to four thousand Marathi speaking ones to
close to three thousand each Tamil and Bengali-speaking followers. Indian Army
is followed by French, Portuguese, Arabic, Dutch, Persian,Japanese, Greek and
Spanish speaking people.

Back home, Kolkata
has highest number of followers at over three lakh, followed by Lucknow at over
two and half lakh, New Delhi at over two lakh while cities like Kollam in
Kerala and Karnal in Haryana, Amritsar, Vishakapatnam, Nagpur, Rajkot having
less than ten thousand followers.

Chennai, where the
Army's Facebook page helped coordinate SOS requests from residents stuck in
recent floods has close to two lakh followers, several of them joining it
during the course of the massive rescue operations by the three services along
with the Indian Coast Guard.

"Our role
during such emergencies like in Chennai get us substantial traction," says
a senior official.

NEW DELHI: The
Narendra Modi-led government is unhappy about the haphazard way the 1971
victory over Pakistan is celebrated by the Army on December 16 as Vijay Diwas.
Criticising the indifference of previous governments on the subject, the Prime
Minister’s Office (PMO) has asked the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to laud the
‘glorious’ victory of the entire Indian armed forces. The scale and size have
been left to the three forces to decide, but the PMO is insistent on “bringing
out the concept of jointmanship” and create a spectacle worthy of the
achievements.

In the 1965 victory
celebrations, only the Army and the Indian Air Force (IAF) had played a role.
For the 1971 war celebrations, the PMO now wants the Navy to participate to
make the exercise a joint effort. The war was the only one India had fought,
which involved the Army, Navy and the IAF.

India’s naval
blockade on the Bay of Bengal trapped the Eastern Pakistan Navy, and prevented
repairs on its warships. Aircraft carrier INS Vikrant and warships INS Guldar,
INS Gharial, INS Magar, and submarine INS Khanderi wreaked havoc on Pakistan
Navy. It also sank Pakistan’s moribund submarine Ghazi. In ‘Op Trident’, the
Navy used missile boats to damage Pakistani destroyer PNS Khyber and
minesweeper PNS Muhafiz on the nights of December 4 and 5. Simultaneously, IAF
fighter jets, some of which took off from the INS Vikrant, bombed enemy
territory, and effectively wiped out Pakistan’s air capability.

On December 16,
1971, the chief of the Pakistani forces, General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi,
along with 93,000 troops, surrendered to the Indian Army and Mukti Bahini, led
by General Jagjit Singh Aurora.

Modi has been
insistent on giving due credit to the armed forces, by glorying India’s wars.
In August-September, the defence forces held 25 days of mega events to mark the
golden jubilee of the 1965 Indo-Pak war. The PMO was firm that these should not
only pay tributes to our war heroes but also “negate Pakistan’s incorrect”
perception on the war’s outcome.

The PMO had earlier
directed the Army to commemorate the centenary year of its participation in WW
I. In a testimony to the Modi government’s focus on Indian military history,
projects like creating a National War Memorial and a war museum have been
cleared. The MoD is publishing a coffee table book on the history of India’s
Republic Day parades since 1950. Theministry is also making telefilms on the wars fought by the Indian armed
forces.

GAYA: Proud parents
and other family members watched as 193 newly-inducted officers of the Indian
Army on Friday morning took a vow to make sacrifices for protecting the
territorial boundary and honour of the nation.

The 193 Army
officers took the vow at a special function organized at Gaya Officers Training
Academy (OTA) on the occasion of their passout ceremony. They are a mix of 127
freshers and 63 lower-rank Army personnel selected for yearlong basic military
training to become special commissioned officers (SCOs).

Lt Gen K J Singh,
general officer commanding in-chief of the Western Command, was the reviewing
officer of the passing out parade, the most important event of the Gaya OTA.

Besides the inducted
Army officers, a batch of 142 Gentlemen cadets also completed their basic
military training and would now be joining different technical institutes of
the Indian Army to pursue Engineering degree course.

Addressing the
newly-inducted officers, Lt Gen Singh recalled the glorious traditions of the
Indian Army and hoped they would do the country proud.

Indian Army was
always in a state of preparedness to meet any challenge, said Singh.

He also exhorted the
officers joining the Army to adapt themselves to the ever-changing techniques
of warfare and make good use of technology. Lt Gen Singh also said the SCOs
held special responsibility as they were expected to work as a bridge between
the Army rank and file. Gaya OTA commandant Lt Gen Vinod Vashist also addressed
the newly-inducted officers.

On Friday evening,
Gaya OTA cadets and their trainers teamed up to present a scintillating
multi-activity display that included fly past by two microlight aircraft, horse
show, Malkhamb display, physical training, Khurki dance and Gatka. Malkhamb,
Khurki and Gatka represent different regional martial arts. Whereas Malkhamb is
the traditional martial art of Western India, Gatka is associated with northern
India. Gatka was basically developed for territorial defence against invaders.

The show jumping
presented by the cadets displayed horsemanship, jumping technique and obedience
level of the horse. Combining jumping skills with tent pegging, the performers
enthralled an invited audience that included the family members of the cadets.

The historic and
imposing Chetwode Building of the Indian Military Academy (IMA) was the perfect
backdrop to the spellbinding passing out parade of 519 gentlemen cadets of the
137 Regular and 120th Training Graduate (TG) Courses, who were the cynosure of
all eyes on Saturday morning. While 469 of the cadets were commissioned in the
Indian army, fifty were foreign cadets from countries like Afghanistan, Bhutan,
Maldives, Nepal, Mauritius, Seychelles and Sri Lanka.

Over 2,000 people
had gathered at the venue much before the parade began. The last night drizzle
had made the air nippy and there was a distinct chill which however slowly
dispersed as the sun came out.

For most people
though, their eyes were riveted on the majestic Chetwode Building named after
Philip Chetwode, commander-in-chief of Indian forces who delivered a stirring
address at the inauguration of the academy in 1932, a part of which has now
become the IMA credo. Even before the parade started, the audience could hear
the loud roar of the cadets, practicing at the far end of the academy.

The parade began
soon after the arrival of the reviewing officer, army chief, General Dalbir
Singh, who arrived on a four-horse carriage, originally belonging to the
Maharaja of Patiala, which was gifted by the erstwhile royal family to the
academy.

Speaking on the
occasion, Gen Singh, said that he was transported back in time to 42 years ago,
when as a gentleman cadet, he had participated in a similar passing out parade
while graduating from the academy. "This is a very important day in your
lives as you join the Indian Army and take the pledge of serving the
country," the Army chief said, advising the cadets to "lead by
example." He also quoted from the IMA credo to emphasize the
responsibility which each officer had: "The safety, honour and welfare of
your country come first, always and every time. The honour, welfare and comfort
of the men you command come next. Your own ease, comfort and safety come last,
always and every time."

The majestic parade
came to an end after each of the cadets had taken the 'antim pag', the final
step inside the Chetwode Building symbolising their induction as officers in
the Indian Army. A highlight of the parade was the fly past of three choppers
that dropped flowers on the venue from the air which lent a festive touch to the
entire atmosphere.